Shuna is a pastry chef in New York City and author of the acclaimed blog Eggbeater.

added about 3 years ago

I love dressing farro salads with Sherry vinegar, coarse sea salt & black pepper. I will also saute escarole, beet greens, spinach or some other silky green to complement the textural nature of a grain salad. I know it sounds off but I also like to grill or quick saute figs but if fruit is out of season or too odd, other vegetables like raw or lightly cooked: turnips, radishes, carrots, zucchini would be lovely. I like to roast, saute and keep raw various ingredients for textural complexity.

Well, there are ingredients I would leave out, in particular the aspargus and the cilantro. Those two don't match anyway. When using farro, keep it simple. That's how they would treat it in Italy anyway. In Umbria (they use farro quite a lot) they might cook the farro with prosciutto end or bone---carrots,celery, olive oil and grated parmigiano to finish and that's it.

Ohh pierino! This response is so...You. The farro is already cooked, and I kept it pretty simple: water. As for the cilantro, I actually think asparagus and cilantro can go great together in Asian-style dishes. Asparagus in a soy vinaigrette with cilantro is quite good. In this case, my scallions and cilantro were already mixed together from tonight's dinner of spring rolls, so I added them both. I think I'm going to go with Merrill's suggestion of a simple vinaigrette, and I've also added some chunks of roasted beet that I made this weekend,inspired by Shuna's rec. I'm sure lunch tomorrow will be, at the very least, edible. Thanks, all, for weighing in.